Cooking appliances, in particular for household use (such as, for example, an oven or a cooking range, wherein “cooking range” refers to a household appliance comprising at least one oven and at least one cooking top), are usually provided with a cooking compartment for cooking foodstuffs, said cooking compartment being obtained in a muffle of the cooking appliance and being delimited by a bottom wall, a back wall, a top wall, and side walls of said muffle.
In addition, known muffles comprise an opening that puts the cooking compartment in communication with the outside environment in order to allow a user to place foodstuffs inside the cooking compartment.
Said opening can be closed with a door, which usually comprises a perimetric frame and supports a suitable thermal glass allowing the user to observe the cooking compartment and any foodstuffs being cooked; also, the door is horizontally pivoted to the oven muffle by means of hinges, which support it and guide its motion as it opens and closes the cooking compartment.
The cooking appliances known in the art are fitted with a lighting device which allows illuminating the cooking compartment and any foods being cooked; said lighting device usually consists of a lamp associated with one of the muffle walls, in particular a back wall of said muffle.
It has however been noticed that such a solution does not provide homogeneous and sufficient illumination throughout the cooking compartment, in particular when foodstuffs to be cooked are present inside the muffle. In fact, in such situations the foodstuffs interfere with the light beam of the lighting device, and create a grey area between the foodstuffs being cooked and the front portion of the muffle.
As a consequence, the above-described solution does not ensure adequate illumination of that portion of the foodstuff being cooked which faces towards the door and the user.
Besides, this problem is even more felt when the cooking compartment is subdivided into a plurality of rack levels. It is in fact known in the art to insert into the muffle at least one support element (e.g. a grid, a baking pan, a dripping pan), the side portions of which are usually associated with the side walls of the muffle; said support elements can be positioned at different heights in the cooking compartment, so that foods can be cooked on multiple levels. It is also clear that such support elements interfere with the light beam of the lighting device associated with a back wall of said muffle, and create a grey area between their body and the front portion of the muffle, thus not allowing proper illumination of that portion of the cooking compartment which faces towards the door and the user.
A cooking appliance (e.g. the one shown in U.S. Pat. No. 7,252,402) is also known in the art which comprises a cooking compartment lighting system associated with a door, said door being horizontally pivoted to a muffle to allow access to the cooking compartment.
While it allows illuminating the portion of the foodstuff being cooked that faces towards the door and the user, it has been noticed that also this system has some drawbacks, since it can only provide illumination of the cooking compartment (and of any element to be cooked placed therein) when the horizontally-pivoted door is in a condition in which it closes the cooking compartment.